Delayed Tau

I checked my inbox yesterday to find I'd received an email from a third party retailer regarding delays to the new Tau releases. Now this doesn't bother me immediately, as I'm not interested in acquiring any Tau in the near future, but it does make me wonder about Games Workshop policies. As has been greatly publicised, Games Workshop recently altered their trade policies, prohibiting online sales by third party retailers in North America and Canada, as well as restricting the amount of direct sale items the retailers can be supplied with. I have heard it pointed out (by miniwargaming, I think) that this policy could not be implemented in Europe as we have all sorts of laws and restrictions regarding monopolies. Whether or not this is true I don't know, as I wouldn't be at all surprised if Games Workshop were perfectly in their remit to restrict sales of their product to just their stores, but that's another discussion. Where this ties in to the new Tau release is with the issue of availability. It's all very well for them to say that demand is higher than expected, but it's difficult to believe they didn't anticipate a lot of people wanting to get hold of new releases for an army that hasn't been updated in years. They essentially have a captive market - the vast majority of people wanting to spend their money on new Tau are not going to go and spend it on something else because they have to wait an extra week. And those who've pre-ordered from them directly are more likely to get their stuff on time, as opposed to those who've ordered from third party retailers at a discounted price. We gamers are an impatient lot, scouring the internet for the latest rumours, estimating release dates and so on. Games Workshop know this. Could it be that Games Workshop are artificially delaying the Tau, citing supply issues, in order to encourage people to pre-order directly from them in the future in order to get their stuff as quickly as possible? How popular each army is, I couldn't say. I wouldn't like to guess. But there will be a lot of people hankering for Eldar when they release, myself included. Maybe I'm just very cynical though, what does everyone else think? And where will you be placing your orders?

I never order anything direct from GW so if they are delaying models in an attempt to get me to order direct then they are going to be disappointed. Whether it works on other people in sufficient quantity to make it a viable business tactic is up in the air but what it does do is create yet more bad feeling towards GW and I cannot imagine this is a good thing for their business. Mind you, pretty much everything GW does is not something I'd imagine is good for their business but they're still here.

I think any conspiracy theories for GW delaying Tau on purpose are bogus.

GW did not anticipate how popular the release would be.

Sky Serpent wrote:

I think any conspiracy theories for GW delaying Tau on purpose are bogus.

GW did not anticipate how popular the release would be.

Not the first time this has happened recently. Makes you wonder what has changed.

I very much doubt it.Its not a new rumour, I remember six months after the Wii was out, there were stories that Nintendo had warehouses full of them they were just refusing to release "to extend the buzz". I was chatting to one guy who had seen the warehouses, or so he claimed. That ten million Wii boxes wouldnt fill a warehouse, never mind several wasnt the point.

Whats the accusation exactly, that GW is supplying GW stores before none GW stores?
How dare they....

Quote :

It's all very well for them to say that demand is higher than expected, but it's difficult to believe they didn't anticipate a lot of people wanting to get hold of new releases for an army that hasn't been updated in years

"A lot" isnt a very specific number.
Should they have printed ten thousand codexs? Ten million?

DominicJ wrote:

Whats the accusation exactly, that GW is supplying GW stores before none GW stores?
How dare they....

They're still taking the money from 3rd party retailers though.

The codexes aren't delayed - you can still play with your old collection using the updated rules as soon as they're available. I'm just surprised they can't produce enough of the new models to allow all third party retailers to fulfill their pre-orders. The product doesn't go out of date, so had they over produced, having some of them sitting around waiting to be sold is hardly the end of the world, although I realise it costs to store them.

If anything, I was actually more surprised by the tone of the email from the retailer, which alluded to the surprise and frustration felt by all, including themselves. I know GW sales practices aren't the most popular, but bashing them to your entire online customer base (I was receiving this email despite not ordering any Tau) hardly seems professional. An email to those customers who had pre-orders they were waiting for surely would have been the more diplomatic approach, as opposed to the "Look what this company whose product you buy from us have gone and done now," method. To mention DominicJ's example, I didn't receive a load of emails from Game, Gamestation, Amazon, Play and Gameplay when the Wii came out and was in short supply, even though I'd ordered from them before but hadn't ordered a Wii. And those rumours were ridiculous - Nintendo couldn't have anticipated that there wouldn't be another "next big thing" right around the corner that everyone would buy instead of the Wii. GW can, because they're the most successful miniature wargames company, who manufacture and retail the product and know exactly what's coming up, because it's invariably something of theirs.

Count Adhemar wrote:

DominicJ wrote:

Whats the accusation exactly, that GW is supplying GW stores before none GW stores?
How dare they....

They're still taking the money from 3rd party retailers though.

I would be amazed if FLGS werent on 30 day from delivery credit terms.
You might pay in full on preorder, but wayland is very unlikely* too

*Pure speculation

Apparently only 17 GW stores in the UK aren't getting their full first day order, only the indies are getting shafted.

Sky Serpent wrote:

Apparently only 17 GW stores in the UK aren't getting their full first day order, only the indies are getting shafted.

Well if they've under-produced then it makes sense to supply their own stores first. I would think that the fact that any GW stores are not getting full day 1 orders suggests there is no agenda here just a failure in the marketing department to properly estimate demand, which is interesting of itself.

Sky Serpent wrote:

I think any conspiracy theories for GW delaying Tau on purpose are bogus.

GW did not anticipate how popular the release would be.

+1
I don't see any real advantage in delaying the release of any of the models either. Gotta admit, I was only going to pick the new Codex first anyhow to figure out what new shiny toys I should pick up later anyways. My Tau will finally escape from the darkest depths of my storage closet!
[EDIT] My LFGS(ind) has all of the stuff in, ready to sell tomorrow. This must be a regional thing?

Evil Space Elves wrote:

[EDIT] My LFGS(ind) has all of the stuff in, ready to sell tomorrow. This must be a regional thing?

If anything, this makes their inability to supply enough stock to third party retailers in the UK more suspect. It seems odd that they can estimate the market in the US better than in the UK... This implies that they're keeping the third party American retailers stocked up because they might as well - they're already clamping down on their online market anyway, and there are lots of stores in areas (so I'm led to believe) that don't have a GW nearby. Until these areas get a GW of their own, these stores will be practically the only way to get hold of the products, so best not to aggravate the customer base too much. Maybe I'm just cynical though. Well, I say maybe...

Having just checked the GW website, they're estimating delays of one to two weeks, even if you order directly from them. I guess they're just daft, and have indeed massively underestimated the market!

The US has its own production facility.
Its also possible there was a production problem.

For a world wide release, the UK will be the last to receive stock, because its quicker to ship to Bradford than Bolivia.
If there is a machinery breakdown near release date, stock shipped to Australia will already be on the way, it'll be UK stock that doesnt get produced.